DRAM prices at mid-2025 rates were ~$2.5/GB for DDR5, and ~$1.5/GB for DDR4. "Hundreds of gigs" of RAM used to be under $500. 128GB of cheapest RAM used to be like $200. It seemed to go over heads for a lot of people that you could get hypothetical future machines on CS/CE textbooks were attainable for that little, for some reason - there seemed to be some fixation on the idea that 16GB is all you need.